Schnittke composed this sonata during 1954-55 when he was studying composition and counterpoint with Yevgeny Golubev, as well as instrumentation with Nikolai Rakov at the Moscow Conservatory. It was composed during Schnittke's second student year. In order to distinguish it from the later Violin Sonatas No. 1-3, it has been designated “Sonata 1955” by the publishers. Schnittke wrote the sonata at a time when the music of Shostakovich had a strong influence upon him. Nonetheless, one can, already in this early work, observe an individual musical language.

Irina Schnittke came upon the manuscript of the present work when viewing the posthumous works of her husband, who died in 1998, and turned it over to the publishers for publication. The world premiere of the Sonata 1955 took place on 9 March, 2003 in London with Daniel Hope, violin, and Ivan Sokolov, piano.

The work has been edited for publication by Daniel Hope and Ivan Sokolov. Completions by the editors have been disignated by brackets, parentheses are by Alfred Schnittke. The sonata was issued on the CD “East Meets West” (Warner Classics No. 2564-61329-2) in 2004.